A RARE 1948 Chevrolet Fleetline recently relocated to the Limestone Coast has been declared Turtle by its Mount Gambier owners due its green colour and inability to move fast.
The Blue Lake city is now home for former Geelong residents Melanie Mclean-Knowles and Aaron Knowles, along with their beloved classic car collection.
As a factory right-hand drive model, the couple believe their Chevrolet is one of only a handful in Australia, originally produced for the South African market.
Ms Mclean-Knowles said the previous Mildura owner had the vehicle imported from the country after visiting the continent with his South African-born wife.
“From our understanding, they went over to visit and he saw it over there and fell in love so brought it home with him,” she said.
“When we picked the vehicle up, he made sure we knew the history.
“He was sad to see it go, but it had quite a few projects to work on.”
Purchasing the eye-catching vehicle around three years ago, Ms Mclean-Knowles said once the decision was made, they packed a suitcase full of tools and flew to Mildura.
“We heard about it through Aaron’s former brother-in-law, but forgot and just put it to the back of our mind for a bit,” she said.
“We decided we really wanted it, so we tried to find it again and through some online searching we did.
“When we arrived, the owner picked us up from the airport, took us around to look, gave us lunch and we ended up staying there for the better half of the day.”
Ms Mclean-Knowles said the trip home to Geelong, which would normally take them six hours, was stretched out to around nine.
“It does not like going any faster than 90kph,” she said.
“When we did get it home, we realised it was probably a bit rougher than we hoped for.
“It honestly looked like somebody had jumped off the roof and landed on it, there were massive chunks of paint missing and huge parts with bog.”
Ms Mclean-Knowles said the car was stripped down and painted in its two-tone Volkswagen-Audi Kaktusgruen Pearl and Gecko Green Metallic colours.
“We started from the back, and on one panel there was two replacement patches and we just immediately reconsidered our decision,” she said.
“But that was it across the entire car and the rest was in mint condition.
“We had to have someone else paint it as we could not do it ourselves and we are super happy with how it turned out.”
Fitted with its original 216 Stovebolt engine and three-on-the-tree manual transmission, Ms Mclean-Knowles said all it needed after its paint job was a service and some new tires.
“There are no modifications other than the fact we have tried to add as many of the original accessories as possible,” she said.
“Some we have been able to get, but others we could not get original, so we have purchased reproduced ones.
“We have almost everything you can think off and we also had it lowered four inches by Custom, Chassis Panel and Paint owner Mark Fry.”
Ms Mclean-Knowles said her favourite part of the vehicle was the car’s seats and its retro old-school style.
“I think the backseat is like a lounge and is very comfortable,” she said.
“All the nobs and switches make it very art deco and it is just old-school cool.”
Ms Mclean-Knowles said the car was not going anywhere any time soon, with hopes to develop a pin-striped candy roof.
